The Mayor of Rio de Janeiro has joked that he’ll fix complaints about the Australian quarters of the Olympic Village by providing a kangaroo ‘to make them feel at home’.
Yesterday, news came out that the athletes apartments were straight up ‘unliveable’, with lighting issues, electrical cables hanging from ceilings, and plumbing concerns.
Australian Olympic Committee Chef De Mission Kitty Chiller – who has the best name in the world – confirmed that our Olympians were hoping to move into the village on Sunday, but would not be due to its current ‘uninhabitable’ state:
“For over a week now AOC staff have been working long hours to get our section of the village ready for our athletes.Problems include blocked toilets, leaking pipes, exposed wiring, darkened stairwells where no lighting has been installed and dirty floors in need of a massive clean.In operations areas water has come through the ceiling resulting in large puddles on the floor around cabling and wiring.”
The AOC did a stress test, which showed that the apartments were not fit:
“We decided to do a “stress test” where taps and toilets were simultaneously turned on in apartments on several floors to see if the system could cope once the athletes are in-house.
The system failed. Water came down walls, there was a strong smell of gas in some apartments and there was “shorting” in the electrical wiring. ”
However, despite the fact that the AOC sees this as no laughing matter – 400+ displaced atheltes is no laughing matter, tbh – Rio de Janeiro’s mayor Eduardo Paes is focussing on the funny side.
He told press:
“I almost feel like putting a kangaroo in front of their building to make them feel at home.”
While a pet kangaroo sounds really fun and adorable, 400+ displaced athletes isn’t really a laughing matter.
Source: SMH.
Photo: Buda Mendes / Getty.
